Cognomens

[The Priest]

I think you are right. This would all be part of giving strategic choices - different pathways of development which gave their own advantages but can't all be pursued. It would be like having some traits which come as a result of the paths you follow in the game. The civ determines the basic starting traits but you can add to them as well by your actions. Elizabeth is always X and X (can't quite remember - financial and philosphical?) but in this game she was also proclaimed 'defender of the faith' for her religious building programme and wars against the infidels, which gave a happiness bonus to cities with 2 religious buildings / half the length of anarchy etc.

[johnmcd]

First round the world should get a +1 movement bonus for ships and the title of 'the Navigator'.

[Fleme]

Some possible titles and triggers:

The Great (first to conquer cities from 2 rivals)
The Conqueror (first to completely conquer a rival)
The Destroyer (first one to raze 2 enemy cities)
The Cunning (first one to conduct 2 offensive espionage missions)
The Supreme (first in the overall powergraph for x consecutive turns)
The Builder (first one to produce a total of 2000 hammers, all production combined)
The Wise (first one to produce a total of 2000 beakers, all research combined)

Alternatively, you could have negative titles, such as

The Puny (smallest empire for x consecutive turns)
The Weak (weakest army for x consecutive turns)
The Meek (willingly vassalizes)

I could think of some small bonuses to go with each title too but I think that'd be too much since this is all just a bit of hypothesis anyways.

[Yosho]

Some other good ones:

The Pius: First one to build 10 religious buildings (temples, monistaries, cathedrals)

The Brave: Declares war on a neighboring civ with 50% greater total power

The Lionhearted: The first leader to win two religious wars (wars against someone of another religion)

The Crusader: First to spread (as in, personally spread through use of missionaries) their state religion into 15 cities.

Patron of the Arts: First to get the culture of their capital city past a certain number (probably would very with map size or whatever)

Obveously, some of these are much harder/riskier to get then others, so they should have bigger rewards.

[eris]

Not directly related to the subject, but I have to mention it.

In my last game I tried the gambit of using the first Great General to make my first scout a Medic III unit. It worked pretty well. I even gave him the free upgrade to Explorer. It wasn't until a few turns later that I noticed the title of my unit. It was "Iven the Terrible (Explorer)", which of course reads as "Ivan, the Terrible Explorer.

I don't know what made him such a terrible explorer, but he functioned well as a medic. That part of the gambit paid off nicely.

But every time I saw the unit title I thought of this thread and how some cognomens (love that word!) are definitely open to misinterpretation.

[Brutus66]

Originally posted by Fleme
The Destroyer (first one to raze 2 enemy cities)

I like it. Coincidentally, I read the other day that George Washington was given the name
"Town Destroyer" by the American Indians.